Clinton turns sights to general election
Rachel Maddow reports on Hillary Clinton shifting the focus of her campaign to general election strategy ahead of the Indiana primary as Bernie Sanders continues to insist he will contest the Democratic nomination at the national convention.

What's up;

Rachel Maddow doesn't want a candidate to force a contested convention so is campaigning against it.

She points out a TINY bit of the story from 2008 about Obama & Hillary.

Funny thing is that while Rachel Maddow puts up these figures she leaves out the fact that the media has been ADDING the super delegates to Hillary's total (including when she was commentating with the others of Bernie Sander's Indiana win) to give her the momentum to win. It's not like the media doesn't know that news doesn't affect belief.

Here is what MSNBC and other media stations show the people most of the time (the wrong numbers, i.e. numbers that (look for how the delegates are portrayed at the bottom of the screen);

This is one of the media's many ways of trying to influence the perception of the people to pick the establishment candidate. More listed in the article extract below;

Here is a close up;

I'm just saying, Maddow's hypocrisy (or blindness dues to emotional involvement) on this issue is glaringly obvious. Saying a higher total due to the Super Delegate by the media helps create teh perception of momentum WHICH ACTUALLY CREATES MOMENTUM. The media knows this. It's why they can brag about influencing people. But when there is an emotional involvement in the candidate (irrespective of evidence) clearly no one in the corporate media hast any moral qualms about betraying everything America stands for.

When Sanders began his campaign, as he often recounts, he had virtually no national name recognition and trailed Clinton by 60 to 70 points in national polls. The major media barely breathed his name, even when he began drawing crowds of 20,000 or more to summer rallies. This was partly the result of the obsession with Trump, but also because the conglomerates controlling the media hardly wanted to promote such a fierce critic of Wall Street and the 1 percent.

In December, the nightly news networks had allotted Trump 23 times more coverage than Sanders; on ABC alone 81 minutes to Trump for the year, compared to only 20 seconds for Sanders. While Sanders was holding extensive campaign events and press availabilities for months, Clinton was mostly avoiding public events and media avails, with the media largely ignoring its rebuff. (Even today, Clinton often passes on press conferences.)

2. They’re Debating When?

Ironically, unlike the Republican National Committee, the DNC manipulated its debate schedule to have the fewest number of debates at the worst times, intended to minimize voter viewing, including setting them on holiday weekends and the Saturday night before Christmas.

The goal was to restrict voter exposure and side-by-side comparison with other candidates who offered a significant alternative to Clinton, which served to keep name recognition off Sanders and his prescription for change artificially low. Additional debates were only added much later after widespread condemnation of the DNC.

3. Sanders Booms, Media Works to Marginalize

As the votes began coming in for Bernie, especially with his big win in New Hampshire, Clinton surrogates were given extra time as TV analysts to downplay the results, and the media narrative shifted.

The media paradigm typically is crafted inside the Washington Beltway and New York boardrooms, with other reporters compelled by their own editors or self-censorship to follow along, a practice also known as pack journalism.

The next storyline depicted Sanders as a narrow candidate because the majority of his support came from students, working-class white voters, independents, and low- to moderate-income voters, largely ignoring that Clinton’s own base failed to include any of those groups who would be critical to winning a general election in November. Or that Clinton continues to fail to move support among those constituencies.

4. Vote Rigging

After Sanders’ sweeping win in New Hampshire, the DNC went into hyper drive to break his momentum, starting in the next voting state Nevada.

Concerned Sanders would win Nevada, Sen. Harry Reid, the former Senate Majority Leader and most powerful elected official in Nevada, as it later emerged, arranged a plan with owners of Las Vegas casinos, where many caucuses were being held, and other employers, to ensure Clinton would win. The Nevada caucuses were then rigged with massive voting irregularities such as casino owners orchestrating which workers would be allowed to vote and, in clear intimidation, openly monitoring how they voted.

Vote tampering also occurred in other states, most recently in Arizona where on election day, polling locations were sharply cut forcing many voters to stand in line for up to five hours in the heat, with some leaving before casting a vote.

Voter suppression laws, rampant now across the country, disproportionately disenfranchise students and young voters, a group that has voted for Sanders by margins of up to 80 percent. The laws, passed by right-wing legislatures and governors, also target African Americans and Latinos, which will ultimately harm any Democratic nominee in November.

5. The Sexism Canard

Desperate for attack lines against Sanders, the Clinton camp and her adherents have tried to paint him as a sexist, employing the same tactic of exaggerated small slights they used against Barack Obama in 2008 (remember “you’re likeable enough”). Add in the clumsy effort of Clinton surrogates Gloria Steinem and Madeleine Albright to criticize young women who vote for Sanders.

6. Undemocratic Primaries

Sanders has won the overwhelming majority of independent voters in “open” primaries or caucuses that allow them to vote.

Because of the media blackout, many voters do not gain sufficient information about Sanders until shortly before election day. Early voting reflects lower name recognition for Sanders, benefiting Clinton and enabling her to win some close races.

That contributes to the meme of her inevitability, but does not indicate she is the stronger candidate. In competitive states, Sanders has won a majority of those who voted on election day. When voters have more time to compare candidates based on sufficient information, they tend to choose Bernie.

7. Superdelegates Toe the Line

Enormous pressure was brought to bear on the some 700 superdelegates, mostly Democratic elected officials and other high-profile DNC members, to fall in line behind Clinton, facing intimidation or promises well honed by a Clinton machine that has had 25 years of practice.

The DNC created the undemocratic superdelegate system to confer the power on the Democratic Party hierarchy to handpick their preference and blunt the ability of insurgents to win the nomination after outsiders George McGovern and Jimmy Carter shocked the party establishment by winning nominations in the 1970s.

8. Who’s Most Electable, Who Is Not

It’s repeated over and over by her superdelegates and the media—Clinton is the most electable candidate, and Democrats must rally behind her to beat Trump. The line has been so drummed into the narrative that many voters in exit polls cite it as the reason they voted for Clinton.

One problem: it’s not true. Virtually every poll for months has shown Sanders faring better against Trump, Cruz and Kasich than Clinton, often by a wide margin, even as the media has already played out the attack lines Republicans would use against Sanders.

9. The Math, the Math

The final defense for the Clinton camp and the major media, spinning out from the eastern media centers to local news outlets, is that Clinton is too far ahead in delegates so the race is over.

To strengthen the case, Clinton’s big margin among superdelegates is added to the total of delegates won in primaries and caucuses. Even though, unlike pledged delegates, superdelegates are not committed to their position. They can flip at will, as they did from Clinton to Obama in 2008.

Next time you hear a pundit say Sanders needs to win 60 percent of the remaining delegates, “and that just can’t happen,” consider his 80 percent margin in Idaho and Utah.

In state after state, especially those that are not closed to independents, where Sanders has had time to campaign so voters get to know him, his platform, consistent record and unimpeachable character, and when the voting process is allowed to move forward without open rigging, Sanders does increasingly well.

10. Forward to Victory

Sanders himself says the path to his nomination is challenging, but still within range. States that were the biggest hurdle, in the South where the Clintons have a long history and Sanders was a complete unknown, are all past.

At 12:55 Maddow repeating back, and arguing for, a Clinton talking point that I want to take issue with - 'The reason it wasn't a contested convention in 2008 was because Hillary Clinton DID NOT contest it. Eventhough she had a lead in the popular vote, over then Senator Obama. Even though Barack Obama had beat her in pledged delegates by roughly 4%. He was no where near clinching the nomination without adding Super Delegates. At the end of the primary contests Hillary Clinton made it clear Obama had won fair & square. She endorsed him. She dropped out of the race. She went to the floor in Denver not to fight for the nomination but to personally nominate him for President. It wasn't a contested convention. That's what Barack Obama did in the democratic race with a 4% pledged delegate lead. Hillary Clinton has an 11% lead in pledged delegates. That's not a big enough landslide to clinch the democratic nomination alone with pledged delegates not counting any Super Delegates. She is way out a head by any measure. She is way way way way way way way way way way way way out a head.' (Following comments are based on list of links below and stuff above)

What she seems to find funny is that Sanders would dare contest Hillary over her and the Democratic parties (and medias) use of the Super Delegates to build momentum for Hillary in the public's perception. Clearly, right now the media (including Rachel Maddow) are doing the "We may have bragged about being able to influence public perception before but right now we are going to pretend these views came from the people while we market the latest talking points to get the establishment way"

Rachel Maddow doesn't like it. That's why she was very careful not to ask any pertinent questions (see link list below of possible relevent) about Hillary's past during her last townhall. Smart. Dishonorable. Un-American.

BTW, Rachel Maddow wants all her hate mail directed to Rachel@msnbc.comSo the question is, with only a 4% lead in delegates by Obama, WHY did Hillary Clinton give up so fast? Could it have been the negative publicity of fighting someone who had no problem put her in her lying place?

"Hillary, why are you using racist tactics against Obama? Does this mean you were intentionally using racist call words like "super predators" to put black kids away for life (I understand using "thugs" is a new thing and "gang" was the old thing)

OR

"Hillary, why do you smile so much when you lie and are caught lying while you nit pick on Obama and the media lets you. I mean your lies are big but still you stand there smiling like you just put one over everybody. Are you a habitual liar or do you just enjoy it during elections?"

OR

"Hillary, you supported the Iraq War vote with the passion you gave to supporting - the already proven to be faulty - crime bill of 1994 to win right wing votes for an election... will you say and do anything no matter how bad it is for the country and it's citizens as long as it's polling well? Or was that old Hillary the real Hillary? Yes, we understand that you said it was a mistake and endorsing the TPP 45 times was a mistake and the crime bill was a mistake (looking into others), well, I don't quite know if people care about your first two terms in office... you are a woman, so "third term for candidate if they are women" seems to be a popular thing right now... anyways, I digress, the point is, if your experience is one of always making the wrong decisions and then apologizing for it can we really risk such a person leading the country during these tumultuous times? We already know about how you took part in destabilizing Libya, Yemen ..." I could go on for a while.Related explanatory blog posts that busts Maddow's views/false-news-marketing up;

Quotes

"Make peace with the universe. Take joy in it. It will turn to gold. Resurrection will be now. Every moment, a new beauty." - Rumi

"God is a metaphor for that which transcends all levels of intellectual thought. It's as simple as that." - Joseph Campbell

"Naturally, every age thinks that all ages before it were prejudiced, and today we think this more than ever and are just as wrong as all previous ages that thought so. How often have we not seen the truth condemned! It is sad but unfortunately true that man learns nothing from history." - Carl Jung

"Of all the animosities which have existed among mankind, those which are caused by difference of sentiments in religion appear to be the most inveterate and distressing, and ought most to be deprecated. I was in hopes that the enlightened and liberal policy, which has marked the present age, would at least have reconciled Christians of every denomination so far that we should never again see the religious disputes carried to such a pitch as to endanger the peace of society." - George Washington

“If a problem is fixable, if a situation is such that you can do something about it, then there is no need to worry. If it's not fixable, then there is no help in worrying. There is no benefit in worrying whatsoever.” - Dalai Lama

“Be empty of worrying. Think of who created thought! Why do you stay in prison. When the door is so wide open?” ― Rumi